A place to record my adventures of being a gentle consumer and living more fully, with less stuff.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Sometimes it Happens

Sometimes it happens like this.

You have something else in mind for the afternoon, like gathering stinging nettle, and you're biking along the path when a carpet of purple catches your eye. The violets are blooming! You slow down just enough to get a sense of size and readiness and suddenly you are enveloped in sweet, heady perfume. Yes, without a doubt it's violet season. Your heart sings and your brain effortlessly switches gears to process this new information.

Ok, the nettles will stand being picked first and do just fine waiting in the bike basket. The delicate violet flowers definitely need to be picked last and returned home as quickly as possible. This decision gets made in a split second. The bike carries you on, you haven't stopped. You gather the nettles and are mildly relieved to see they haven't grown as much as you thought since your last visit, due to lack of rain. There is still a long season to harvest ahead of you yet. At the same time, you worry a little and hope the forecast for rain the next day comes to pass.

Then it's back to the violet patch. You fold your body down onto the ground in the middle of them all, inhale the scent deeply and happily settle to your task of gently plucking the cheerful, little flowers. You become aware of the sound of the wind in the trees, various birds calling, squirrels chirruping. You vaguely register other people passing by. You feel the space where your thighs rest on the cool, damp earth. You watch a bee stop to gather nectar. You slip into a state of utter relaxation and peace. You think, "I am so content right now."

And sometimes it happens like this.

You take the way home through the woods and see a carpet of trout lilies. And there through the trees a patch of ramps, and another over there. And there, the trilliums are up but not yet blooming, and are those...? Yes, in amongst the trout lilies the spring beauties are in full bloom. You don't harvest a single thing. Instead you take it all in and admire the diversity of this fragile, forest eco-system in the middle of the city. The sun comes out from behind a cloud washing everything in a late afternoon glow and you think, "I am so grateful that this place is here and that I am a witness to it."

And sometimes it happens like this.

You take an early morning walk along the edge of a lake. The first thing you notice is that you can't hear the sound of single vehicle. Something inside of you relaxes a little. You feel the warmth of the sun on your back as you make your way along the narrow path. You watch the wind send ripples across the water, a bird circles overhead riding an updraft. You come to a stand of alders growing right up near the water's edge. Drawn to them you approach carefully, picking your way over the sodden ground. You notice both the male and female flowers, the catkins having already released their pollen. You see the beginning leaf buds and pluck one. Tasting the bud you think, 'Bitter. Cooling. Maybe stimulating too.' You have been wanting to work with the medicine of this tree for a while now and wonder if this is the right time. You reach out and place a hand on a slender trunk, close your eyes and ask a silent question. The answer is 'no'. Respectfully you move along the the next tree. This time the answer is 'yes'. You gratefully take out your trusty leatherman tool and start making clean cuts of the smaller side growth, snipping the twigs right at the growing node. You move through the stand asking, leaving some, gathering from others. The sun climbs. This being the first time getting to know the tree, you only take a small amount. Just enough to make a half-pint each of tincture and oil. You take comfort in the fact that this is just the beginning of a relationship that will hopefully last for many, long years. You retrace your steps along the edge of the lake deeply relaxed, at peace and filled with gratitude.

And sometimes it happens like this.

The world outside is dark. The light shines out of your window into the night. Inside is warm and cosy. Dinner dishes dry next to the sink. Music plays. You choose two jars, clear a space on the counter and spread out the alder twigs onto the cutting board. Using a pair of scissors you meditatively cut up the twigs into small pieces that fill the jars. Into one jar you pour in olive oil, into the other 90% alcohol. As you are doing all this, sometimes singing along to the music, you realise that a growing feeling of joy is filling you up until you're practically bursting with it. You let the feeling wash over you as the reddish brown twigs pass from your hands into the jars, trying not to think too hard about what makes this moment different from all the other moments of you standing in the same spot with plants in your hands. You understand that this is not a moment for thinking, but for quietly observing and experiencing, simply being. For one fleeting instant you move beyond thought and knowing, language leaves, time stops.

Your new favourite song comes on, you put lids on the jars, label them and think, "There is sunshine and lake water and joy in this medicine." You fill up the kettle for tea.

Raison d'etre

In 2008 I didn't buy anything new for the whole year. Food and basic toiletries (but not toilet paper) were the obvious exceptions (twice I broke my own rule). Used items were allowed, but I tried really hard to reduce consumption as much as possible.

I finished my year successfully, and along the way learned a lot about how much the world consumes, the waste we produce, sustainability, voluntary simplicity, climate change, peak oil, resource depletion, the water crisis, the food crisis, voting with your dollar, voting with your fork....

With the help of the Awesomedudeguy (ADG), I'm continuing my exploration of living lightly and frugally, while increasing my self-sufficiency and resiliency, staying debt free, and preparing for a climate changed, resource depleted world, in uncertain economic times.

My nothing new restriction is lifted, but I continue to be a gentle, local consumer as much as possible.

My hope is that some of the information and resources I post about here will be helpful to others. Thanks so much for stopping by !

Yours in unstuffing,Amber

"Forgive me if I never visit. I am from the fields, you know, and while quite at home with dandelion, make a sorry figure for the drawing room" ~Emily Dickinson

"I never had any other desire so strong, and so like covetousness, as that.... I might be master at last of a small house and a large garden, with very moderate conveniences joined to them, and there dedicate the remainder of my life to the culture of them and the study of nature." ~Abraham Cowley

"The laws of nature are under no obligation to cater to our culture’s emotionally charged fantasies of perpetual progress and limitless growth." ~John Michael Greer

"Sometimes we think we are too small to make a difference in this big world. Our actions seem insignificant in comparison to global issues such as climate change and population growth. However, the reality is that action on an individual level is exactly how big changes are made. Without individual and family sustainability, there’s no community sustainability. And without community sustainability, there’s no global sustainability. In fact, earth-wide change is absolutely impossible without individual change.It really does come down to you and me."~From Living Sustainably: It's Your Choice

"The universal conspiracy of the silent-assertion lie is hard at work always and everywhere, and always in the interest of a stupidity or a sham, never in the interest of a thing fine or respectable. Is it the most timid and shabby of all lies? It seems to have the look of it. For ages and ages it has mutely laboured in the interest of despotisms and aristocracies and chattel slaveries, and military slaveries, and religious slaveries, and has kept them alive; keeps them alive yet, here and there and yonder, all about the globe; and will go on keeping them alive until the silent-assertion lie retires from business--the silent assertion that nothing is going on which fair and intelligent men and women are aware of and are engaged by their duty to try to stop." ~Mark Twain

"It is not enough simply to abstain from theft...We must remember that nothing in this world really belongs to us. At best, we are merely borrowers. It is our duty, therefore, to borrow no more from the world than we absolutely need, and to make full and proper use of it. Taking more than we need, and wasting it, is a form of stealing from the rest of humankind."~Commentary on Sutra 30 The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali